


By The Sun, By The Wind

by SecondFromTheRight



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Canon Deaths Only, Episode s09e15: The Calm Before, F/M, Gen, Multiple Characters Mentioned
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-26
Updated: 2019-03-26
Packaged: 2019-12-18 09:27:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,360
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18247052
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SecondFromTheRight/pseuds/SecondFromTheRight
Summary: “You don’t need it.” Daryl repeats with a soft pant, trying to convince her of something.His hand is covering hers, the pink of their skin contrasting against her knife and then she feels the pressure from the grip she has on her weapon.Now she realises she’s been doing it, she can’t let go. She needs it, she does need it. He's wrong. It wasn’t just wind that had the…his…head…moving. She saw. She does need it, she thinks, tightening her hold even more. She won’t leave him like that.





	By The Sun, By The Wind

**Author's Note:**

> Short continuation of the pike scene.
> 
> I was basically fascinated by Carol's refusal to let go of her knife in the last shots of the scene. Even when she puts her hands on Daryl, she's still clutching it.

“Hey.” Daryl’s murmur in her ear is the first thing she becomes consciously aware of; the first sound other than the wind and some cries behind her. He’s moving, turning her in his arms and she only realises because she falls back some, but he catches her. She can’t fall down. She can’t be on the ground. It has to be different this time. She can’t… She can’t. _Henry_. _Sophia_. No.

She lurches forward instead, the breath going out of her, but Daryl is still there, keeping her up on her feet even as she heaves over the arms circling her. One of those arms tightens before dropping away; he shifts himself so the arm still around her balances her.

“Hey, gimme this, okay? You don’t need it right now.” He says slowly, carefully and her confusion is the only thing that has her raising her head to look at him. She blinks as she stares, tears and hair getting in the way of her vision, but she can still see the way his eyes lower worryingly down her face, and further. Letting her head drop, realising how heavy it feels, how heavy everything feels, she finds where his focus is.

“You don’t need it.” Daryl repeats with a soft pant, trying to convince her of something.

His hand is covering hers, the pink of their skin contrasting against her knife and then she feels the pressure from the grip she has on her weapon.

Now she realises she’s been doing it, she can’t let go. She needs it, she _does_ need it, he's wrong. It wasn’t just wind that had the… _his_ …head…moving. She saw. She does need it, she thinks, tightening her hold even more. She won’t leave him like that.

Task in mind, she stands up straight by herself for the first time since Daryl reached her. She controls her breath, accepting the harsh breeze on her skin. It will be worse at the top of the hill, where…where she needs to be. She pushes slowly against Daryl, opening her shoulders and letting her elbows and arms separate herself from him. With his hand still on hers though, he goes with her.

“Hey, no.” he says as she turns around to face the hill.

He moves his feet trying to stop her. As she meets his body, right to left from the way he side-steps her, she remembers something. The wind becomes sun, the cold sweat on her becomes sweat from the heat and she feels scratches and dirt from a Cherokee Rose bush on the skin of her covered arms. It’s Shane in front of her instead of Daryl, the sounds of insects and water replace the howl of the wind and the crying of the others. The memory makes her take an unsteady step back, away from Daryl as she tries to get hold of herself.

He waits, respecting the move away from him but he stands and stares at her. Waiting. He doesn’t try to manoeuvre her or come towards her, just stands looking at her. He gives a shake of his head and she focuses on the movement of his hair in the wind. Wind. Then she looks at his shoulders, his clothes. Darker, for colder weather. She stares at every part of him until it grounds her back. She’s not in Georgia, _they’re_ not in Georgia. It’s not years ago, it’s now. It’s not her daughter, it’s her son. Hundreds of miles and thousands of days and all she has is the dead marking who she is.

“Daryl.” She whispers feeling tears fill her eyes again.

Her words seem to make him move again, he’s back in her space, one hand reaching out to cover her fist again. He lowers her hand in his but she doesn’t release her grip, she can’t. Her arm sits locked.

“I have to.” She cries, her lungs burning and she tries to draw something real from it. It should hurt, it should burn all the way through her.

“You don’t.” he tries to assure her.

“I do. I can’t leave him like that,” She insists with a shake of her head. She did nothing last time as what was left of her girl stumbled towards her. Rick handled it; he’s not here anymore. He’s gone like all of them, like Sophia, like Mika, like Lizzie, like Carl, like Henry. “I have to.” She says again.

“I’ll do it,” he utters, close. “I’ll do it.”

“No, he’s mine,” she argues, feeling a sob escape her as she realises. _Was_. “He was mine,” she cries. “He was mine.” She feels herself sway to the side as all her energy drains again. And then Daryl’s arm is around her, ducking to catch her. The pressure in her hand unwinds as she lets go of her knife; Daryl uncurling her fingers and taking it in his own hand. He takes it quickly, tucking it away somewhere out of her sight. The move unbalances them and she feels herself tilt. Daryl’s there again, he’s all he can see but the step he takes to save her has their feet twist, almost tangling with each other as the angle of the hill pulls her down. He goes with her, almost spinning her as they fall together so she lands with her back to his chest, one of his feet hooked over her ankle. His arms are wrapped around her again, over her own; she feels how tight his hold is from the way she bumps against him with every sob she gives as they sit there.

She’s on the ground, again. _They’re_ on the ground, again. No, no. Not again. She can't. “Please, no,” she can’t help cry, shuttering out her pain. “Not again.”

Daryl’s heavy against her back. She feels him dip his head against her shoulder as she rocks uncomfortably, her upper body almost circling over and over as much as she can with Daryl’s arms on her. Taking a deep, unsteady breath, she leans back against him. Trees at the bottom of the hill stare back at her. It seems so quiet and peaceful, but the leaves and branches move in the wind and she remembers what else is in the way of the wind right now, up the hill behind her, the dead moans the wind carries to her, she remembers the woods they lost Sophia in – she lost Sophia in.

“They were mine.” She whispers, staring at the individual trees that stand in line at the bottom of the hill, seeing those pikes in her mind instead. Seeing Sophia at the end of the row next to Henry.

Daryl releases breath, and maybe tension as he suddenly leans against her even more, fully blanketing her. She _feels_ it. He’s even heavier and she needs it. There’s cold on her cheeks as the breeze hits her tears – she needs that too.

“Daryl.” She says hopelessly.

How is this happening again?

Even with the familiarity of Daryl on the ground with her as she cries over another loss, it doesn’t change in her mind this time. The ground beside her stays uneven grass, not flat, dusty dirt. It’s Michonne’s, Siddiq’s and Yukimo’s cries of shock and grief, not Lori’s, Andrea’s and Hershel’s that she hears. Just trees, and open space, no barn. And she knows it’s just heads and not bodies behind her. That first world is gone, everything she knows of it is gone, except Daryl. And now she’s lost another world, but Daryl’s still here with his arms around her. She feels grateful, and broken.

“Daryl.” She says again, gripping his forearms in front of her as the only thing she recognises anymore. She doesn’t know what to do, or say. How is she going to tell Ezekiel? She doesn’t know how she’ll ever get back up.

“I’ll get him down.” He vows, his voice low against her ear.

She nods her head in acceptance, a pained moan coming from her as she closes her mouth and tries to stop crying. Getting Henry down from there is more important than her ever getting back up.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading.
> 
> I'm an Ezekiel fan so while all Caryl love is way welcome, please don't leave any Ezekiel hate in comments.


End file.
